


Chaos Theory

by fluffsaur



Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bodyguard, Bodyguard Hyejoo, F/F, Mafia Boss Chaewon, Sooyoung is kind of there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-10-26 01:09:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20733758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fluffsaur/pseuds/fluffsaur
Summary: Hyejoo was seventeen when she was assigned to mafia boss Park Chaewon’s bodyguard team. And, like a catalyst for destruction - with one tiny flap of a butterfly’s wings, she farms the seeds of chaos.





	Chaos Theory

**Author's Note:**

> Here’s the Hyewon Bodyguard/Mafia Boss AU, which was birthed from a [short comic](https://twitter.com/moonfluffing/status/1170344365346082816) that I drew on Twitter! I really enjoyed writing this, it’s a slightly different style than I used to write in. I hope I did it some justice. 
> 
> Grammar/spelling mistakes are all on me, it’s my first time writing in a while so bare w me hehe 
> 
> Enjoy! :^)

Hyejoo’s life is comprised of nothing but misfortune.

It’s a curse of sorts, she thinks. Some sort of infernal intervention.

She studies herself in the murky reflection on her phone screen. The eyes that stare back are older than she remembers them being. More tired. She rubs a hand over them, relishing the warmth over her heavy eyelids. 

Twinge. She winces, lowering her phone. She keeps her hand pressed to her eyes, but even that arm begins to hurt. She shifts her it to her other arm, nails scratching almost absently against the rough bandage wrapped around the forearm. The pale gauze under her nails is steadily growing redder; she halts when a particularly sharp pain renders her arm immobile. She regards the bloodied bandage placidly, regretting her habits.

It was still pristine, she thinks, when Wonwoo and Chaewon had just left. Wonwoo had done a good job staunching the bleeding. She wonders if she’s messed it up. 

“Bloody hell,” she mutters, eyes wandering over to the k-drama being played on the TV. Wonwoo had turned it on to distract her while he sterilised her wound. It hurt like a bitch. She hadn’t really watched it at all. She’d been distracted by other things. 

Other things mainly being the back of the dark-haired girl standing just a little off to the side, staring quietly out the window. Not even looking at her. Not even after her life had been saved by Hyejoo’s quick reflexes. Hyejoo doesn’t know. Doesn’t know why her chest had hurt when it was her arm that had nearly been shot. 

It shouldn’t be like this. Park Chaewon is just her boss. 

So  _ why _ ? 

She feels it again. A dull, clawing ache in her chest. 

The white noise grows unbearable. 

So she shuts the TV off, and drowns herself in the silence. 

  
  


-

  
  


Hyejoo was seventeen when her world was turned upside down. 

She’d always been a quiet kid growing up. She attended church with her parents every Sunday. Volunteered at youth camps. Did decently at school; her mom liked to brag glowingly that she’d placed fourth in her school in English. She’d even dated a boy from church for a while, until she didn’t. Because she’d realised something crucial. 

That  _ something crucial _ was the manifestation of several years of questioning, denying, and ultimately repressing. She’d realised it a little too late, because when she did, she’d been dating the boy for seven months, and every month had made her unhappier. 

She’d realised it too late, because when she did, he lost it. It wasn’t his fault, not really - she’d insisted that it was her, not him. Maybe she should have chosen a better time to do it, but she was tired, and her mind was muddled. He was angry, oh, so angry, and had yelled it. Right in front of the congregation. Right in front of her parents, who had looked at her like she had turned into something akin to a beast. 

“Hyejoo - he’s lying,” her mother had said, gritting out a smile. “Right?” 

If there was a bad habit Son Hyejoo had, it was that she couldn’t lie. She should’ve kicked that habit. 

The refusal to make eye contact was enough. 

It wasn’t just the revelation - it was the public humiliation, too, that pushed her parents to drive her back home, trade glancing words with the daughter that they were slowly losing, and finally, kick her out of the house with nothing but her backpack, her dead phone and the clothes on her back. 

She begged and begged. Knocked on the door, pleaded. But no amount of begging would move parents who saw her as an alien. 

She’d stumbled out onto the streets as dusk faded to an inky night, alone and panicked. She didn’t have friends close enough to turn to - she didn’t even know where any of her schoolmates lived. She didn’t know where to go. The police? What would she do then? They’d return her home to parents who didn’t want anything to do with her anymore. Even the streets were empty. 

It took a lot to make Son Hyejoo cry, but that day, it took surprisingly little. 

She cried in the light of a convenience store, wanting someone to notice her. To take pity on her. To help her. 

No one did.

As the night grew colder, she’d moved closer to the warmth of the store, hungry. A man had exited the store then, reeking of alcohol, and had spotted her. She was alone, panicked, just enough for him to be amused for a bit. His grip on her arm was so tight that her hand was beginning to turn white from lack of circulation. 

“Let go of me!” 

Hyejoo had managed to pull her swiss army knife from the side pocket of her bag, clammy fingers pulling the blade out - she’d cut her finger a bit in her haste, but swung it around anyway, ignoring the burst of pain. It hovered, quivering, in the space between them, a glorified butter knife. 

She could have swung. Could have gutted him right there, and bolted. But she was frozen stiff, terrified. 

Just that morning, she’d woken up as per usual. Had eggs for breakfast. Had done some homework, then gone to church in the afternoon. That was Hyejoo. 

That Hyejoo couldn’t stab someone. 

He’d moved closer, breath reeking, alcohol-reddened lips pulling up in a gruesome smile. He was so, so much stronger than her. Her nails dug crescents into her palm as she turned her head away, breathing audibly. 

Headlights. Hyejoo was blinded; the man took his chance to yank at her arm. The car pulled to a stop by the curb, and then the man was gone. 

The sound of flesh hitting flesh resounded around the empty streets; Hyejoo cringed away from the noise, from the man, falling to the ground. She felt the sidewalk through the denim of her jeans. Everything was surreal. Too much movement, too bright. There was a sickening crunch, then the man collapsed in her peripheral, jaw coated in blood, eyes rolled back so far that only the bloodshot whites were visible. 

She turned away, heaving, knuckles scraped from pressing against the asphalt, white around the knife that was clenched in her sweaty fingers. She threw what little she ate back up, tears squeezing from between narrowed eyes. Her throat burned. 

There was a hand on her shoulder, then. 

It was something out of a movie, she thought. The person’s figure, backlit by the headlights, was even smaller than Hyejoo’s. They had long, black hair that flowed over their shoulders like liquid. Their features were delicate. Exquisite. Most striking were the luminescent green eyes, which bore into Hyejoo’s coldly, freezing her in her place. 

Hyejoo was seventeen when she met Park Chaewon. 

Her saviour. 

  
  
  
  


It was inevitable, she thought, that she’d let herself be intrigued by the enigma that was Park Chaewon. She was, after all, the person who had saved her. 

At eighteen, she was at the forefront of one of the country’s largest underground criminal organisations. Groomed and primed for the role ever since she was a child, she moulded into it with the deftness of a person who feared nothing. Hyejoo respected it, maybe. But her position was a cruel and friendless one, and the lack of both parental care and exposure to similarly-aged friends in her youth had irrevocably destroyed any sense of empathy in her. 

Hyejoo saw it that day, in the way Chaewon neither pitied nor sympathised with her. The hand on her shoulder might’ve been unintentionally comforting, but the eyes - they blew all of that out of the water. 

Nothing about those eyes were warm, or comforting. Even the colour of the irises. They were piercing, calculating, and hellishly angry. Making prolonged eye contact made the skin at the back of Hyejoo’s neck feel tingly; it felt like she was having a staring contest with a predator, and one wrong move would end her. 

Yet, she couldn’t stop staring. 

“Thank you,” Hyejoo had said, exhaling a shuddering breath. “Thank you.” 

Chaewon hadn’t responded. 

Belatedly, Hyejoo had wondered if she wasn’t sure how to. 

  
  


-

  
  


The first time Hyejoo is enthralled by someone, she doesn’t realise how much it will tip the balance. 

_ (The butterfly, emerging from its silken cocoon, unfolds its wings for the first time.) _

  
  


-

  
  


Hyejoo was seventeen when she fired a gun for the first time. 

Son Hyejoo was afraid of many things. She feared the disapproval of her parents and the people around her. The kids who used to pick on her at the playground in third grade. Walking alone at night. Drunk men. Bugs. Spiders. 

None of it could quite equate to the terror of owning a deadly weapon. 

She wasn’t even able to hurt a man with a butter knife. She didn’t know how she could shoot someone. 

“S-sorry,” she winced, her bullet hitting the wall below the target board again. 

Mingyu had regarded her with a mixture of irritation and tiredness, though he kept his voice controlled. He strode over and plucked the pistol from her hands. He turned away before he could see the tears well up in Hyejoo’s eyes. 

“It’s either their head, or yours. Take a break.” 

Hyejoo felt bile rise in her throat. She set her safety gear down, bolted to the bathroom, locked the door behind her, and threw up into the toilet. 

She considered running away. Begging her parents to take her back. They’d probably cooled down by then. Maybe they could sort things out. She could - attend some conversion camp, and let others fix her. 

As she heaved, her fingers curled. 

The very idea repulsed her, beyond shooting a gun. That wasn’t Hyejoo - she would never believe in forcing someone to change who they were. She would never believe that a conversion camp would solve anything. But being in the mafia wasn’t her either. That wasn’t the Hyejoo who used to go to church on Sundays and volunteer at youth camps. That Hyejoo would never, ever shoot a gun with the intent to kill or hurt someone. She just couldn’t bring herself to do it. She couldn’t. 

She had to.

She threw up again. This time, tears tracked their way down her cheeks, and she was blinded by them.

She couldn’t. 

  
  
  
  


She returned ten minutes later, red-eyed and silent. Mingyu gave her a glancing once-over, then looked at his pistol. 

“Did you sort yourself out?” 

She had to get used to this, she thought. The lack of empathy. The past day in the mafia had already changed, and affected her, in more ways than she’d realised. 

“Yes. Let’s continue,” she said, pulling her safety glasses on. 

Mingyu eyed her sceptically. “You sure?” 

She gritted her teeth a little. If she didn’t want to be treated like a kid, she had to stop acting like one. She had to get used to this too. 

“I’m fine.” 

  
  


-

  
  


The first time Hyejoo lies, the dam breaks. 

And, like water flooding a river after being contained for so long, she finds it hard to stop. 

_ (It flaps its wings.) _

  
  


-

  
  


Hyejoo was seventeen when she was assigned to Park Chaewon’s bodyguard team. 

She would be lying if she said she wasn’t intimidated. 

She was the youngest, and the only female bodyguard on the constantly rotating team of five. The others on the team were not rude, most of the time, but each owned much stronger, harsher personalities than she was used to. Some of them were loud, raunchy, and rough. They scorned unnecessary violence but would not hesitate to put bullets in people’s guts. 

Then came Park Chaewon, herself. 

Much like their previous encounters, Park Chaewon was curt at best, and furious at her worst. 

She was especially ill-tempered when one of the organisation’s allies backed out of a deal. Even from outside her office, the bodyguards could hear her swearing. The following hours were hellish; she snapped out every order and kneaded her temples with her knuckles and looking directly into her eyes was akin to shortening the time span of a ticking time bomb. 

Hyejoo was advised to steer clear as much as possible. She was clumsy, a rookie, and already the multiple small slip-ups she’d had on the job was enough to warrant a stream of suppressed vulgarities. 

It made her feel...strange. 

She was reminded acutely of the day, several weeks ago, when her parents had pretty much disowned her. She’d felt something similar back then. 

The fear of being unwanted. 

It flared up again, more painfully, somewhere between her ribcage and her lungs and it made it harder to breathe. 

It flared up again when she looked at Chaewon, whose eyebrows were permanently pulled together and whose lips tilted downwards in anger. She didn’t understand. Chaewon was, beyond the person who saved her, her boss. Chaewon had been her boss for weeks. She shouldn’t be more afraid of being unneeded by Chaewon than by her own parents. 

She had looked away, then. Fixed her eyes on a spot on the wall. Suppressed the force that pressed against her oesophagus, threatening to expel her lunch from her. 

She shouldn’t be more afraid. But for some reason, she  _ was _ . 

And it terrified her.

  
  
  
  
  


She should have seen it coming. 

The combination of their allies backing out, several days gone without a wink of sleep, and reports of unsuccessful meetings from lesser mafia members stoked a rage so potent that Chaewon seemed to be running entirely off it. Her eyes were deadened, the circles ringing them dark and large. She’d long put her dark hair up in a bun. She looked like she was about to pass out, but when Hyejoo questioned the other members, they simply told her to shut it. 

“Common occurrence when something like this happens. You leave her be, hear me?” Said the Chief Bodyguard, giving her a hard stare. 

She’d agreed, then, but it seemed wrong to her. How could they just let Chaewon go without sleep for three days? She was growing so snappish that the entire team was tiptoeing around her. It was taking a toll on everyone, not just herself. 

Hyejoo had had enough. She’d gone into Chaewon’s office on the night of the fourth sleepless day, bowed to an aggravated Chaewon, and said “I think you should take a rest, miss.” 

The rage exploded in its culmination. 

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Chaewon had yelled, voice growing shriller towards the end of the question. She slammed her small hands on the desk, the sound so loud that everyone in the room jumped. Hyejoo physically flinched backwards. “I’m keeping this organisation afloat. I’m doing work to supply your pay checks. Son Hyejoo - you - don’t - get - to - tell - me - to - fucking - rest!” 

There was dead silence after her outburst. Chaewon herself heaved, her arms shaking, bloodshot eyes widened in fury. 

Hyejoo’s mouth opened, then closed. She could feel everyone’s eyes shifting between the two of them, could feel the tension in the three feet of space. 

Tears welled in her eyes. Whether from indignation, or shame, or something else, she didn’t know. For a split second, she had wondered if Chaewon would yell at her for tearing up after being scolded like a child, or fire her, but there was no chance to.

Just as quickly as the thought came, the light in Chaewon’s eyes dimmed. Her head lulled, then her arms, and several men dove forward to support her before she could slam headfirst into her desk. 

Chaos. 

It was quiet, in the way that trained mafia members handled such situations. But it was still chaos. They had a foldable mattress brought up from the storage room, and Hyejoo was tasked with bringing a basin of cool water and a cloth. Everyone was running around, and Hyejoo felt eyes on her back as she moved through the hallways, humiliation and fear burning in her gut. 

She knew it wasn’t really her fault that Chaewon had passed out but - what if that outburst had made her feel so drained that her body just gave up on her? 

She felt her stomach churn at the thought of being the person who brought Chaewon harm. It was her job to  _ protect _ her. Had she failed at her job by confronting her? 

The thoughts were shoved out of her head when she returned to the office. Chaewon had regained consciousness; she was lying down with her arm over her eyes. She moved it slightly to look at Hyejoo as she entered, holding a plastic basin half-filled with water and a clean cloth. 

“Everyone out,” Chaewon commanded, her voice uncharacteristically weak. She cleared her throat. This time it came out louder. “Everyone out.” 

The chief bodyguard looked like he was about to argue, but with a look from Chaewon he clamped his mouth shut. They began filing out. Hyejoo stood awkwardly with her basin and her cloth, waiting for them to pass so she could place the items next to Chaewon and leave. 

“Except you,” said Chaewon. 

All the bodyguards looked back. Chaewon wasn’t looking at any of them, but at Hyejoo. 

Hyejoo swallowed, ignoring the pointed looks from the other bodyguards as they left. Once the last one closed the door behind him, she moved closer to the mattress and placed her items on the ground within Chaewon’s reach, dreading whatever was to come. She wasn’t sure what she was more afraid of - getting fired, or being despised. Her stomach hurt.

There was silence as Chaewon pushed herself into a sitting position and rolled her sleeves up so that they wouldn’t get wet. Hyejoo noticed something she hadn’t had the chance to see before - there was a tattoo of a blue butterfly on the inner part of Chaewon’s left wrist. It was barely three centimetres in diameter, but even from her standing position she could tell that it was detailed. She wondered what its significance was. She wasn’t going to ask. 

Chaewon broke the silence, eyeing her tiredly. “Can you sit?” 

It took a second to register. By then, Chaewon had already looked away, opting to focus on sponging her neck with cool water. Hyejoo swallowed dryly, hitched her dress pants up a little, and folded her legs in a rather uncomfortable cross-legged position on the ground. 

She was already sorely regretting her words. She shouldn’t have told Chaewon she needed to rest. She should’ve heeded her senior bodyguard’s advice and just - kept her mouth shut. She was considering apologising when Chaewon spoke again. 

“You don’t have to apologise, if you’re thinking of it,” she said, squeezing water from the cloth. A few drops of it of it flecked Hyejoo’s pants. “Because I’m not going to apologise, either.” 

Chaewon didn’t sound angry. She didn’t even look angry. Perhaps passing out had been enough of an indicator that Hyejoo was right, and she had accepted that she needed to take a break for a bit. Hyejoo didn’t expect her to admit it, and she certainly didn’t seem like she was going to. If there was anything Hyejoo had learned from being in the mafia, it was that everyone in their ranks had at least one fatal flaw: their pride. 

She wondered if it was her place to speak. She wondered if it was an invitation. Then she told herself to stop wondering, and to just  _ do it _ .

“I wasn't going to apologise,” she said. A lie. She was getting better at it. 

“It certainly looked like you were about to.” Chaewon’s eyes had flickered to hers for a moment, green swirling with worlds of exhaustion and exasperation beyond her years. When Hyejoo met them, she thought of how unfortunate it was that such a beautiful, youthful face would have to be home to such torrid emotion. Then Chaewon looked away, back at a spot on the mattress. “You know why I asked you to stay?” 

Hyejoo stayed mute, prompting Chaewon to continue. 

Green eyes found hers again, this time harder and flintier. “Because you almost seemed like you cared, back there. This is the mafia. There is no space for concern, and I don’t appreciate concern. We are here to do our jobs. Nothing more.” 

Hyejoo understood. But there were the beginnings of a small panic in her stomach. Something that bothered her when she thought about what drove her to tell Chaewon to rest. 

It wasn’t concern. It wasn’t. It was - she didn’t know what it was. 

“I told you to rest because everyone was beginning to get frazzled by your irritability,” Hyejoo said bluntly. “Miss.” 

Chaewon’s lips pressed into a hard line at her words. She could tell that she’d angered the smaller girl again, but this time Chaewon didn’t lash out at her. Maybe she was just too exhausted to. She simply dropped the cloth back into the basin of lukewarm water and pushed the thing towards Hyejoo. “Just do your job, Son Hyejoo, and if you cared, somehow, then stop it.” 

Hyejoo had set her jaw. “I don’t.” 

“Good. Return this to wherever you got it from. On your way out, tell Siwan that I will be returning to my apartment.” 

Her audience with Park Chaewon was over. 

She’d stood up, bowed, then made her way out of the office to inform the Chief Bodyguard of Chaewon’s plans. He’d given her a rather nasty look for her insubordination, but she didn’t flinch. She only let her guard down slightly when she was finally alone in the women’s bathroom, dumping water into the sink.

She let herself have five seconds in the mirror, staring at her own deadened eyes. 

Hyejoo didn’t understand. It was just her job. 

So why? 

Why did she  _ lie _ ? 

  
  
  
  


Belatedly, she wondered if asking her to stop caring was Chaewon’s silent plea for the contrary. 

  
  


-

  
  


The first time Hyejoo shows concern for someone in the mafia, it perplexes her. 

She’s been so desensitised to positive emotion for the past few weeks that it’s almost foreign, but, like a tiny spot on a hard-to-see area, she doesn’t realise that it’s been there all along. 

_ (It soars.) _

  
  


-

  
  


The next few months saw a flurry of activity; Chaewon had managed to strike a deal with a smaller organisation based in the outskirts of Seoul. Something about the trade of contraband that would be mutually beneficial to both parties. 

Hyejoo threw herself into her job, so much so that she’d almost entirely forgotten about the fact that she’d essentially disappeared off the face of the earth to her parents. Sometimes she wondered if they were looking for her, or if they even cared. Those thoughts only came to her occasionally, when sleep would evade her in the late nights, but they would eventually dissipate. As they always did. She convinced herself that she didn’t have the emotional capacity to care anymore, especially with the extreme lack of it at her job. 

(‘Convinced’ was the keyword, but she had become adept at ignoring her foolish musings.) 

The interactions between Hyejoo and Chaewon had been kept at a minimum, considering how frequently Chaewon spent hours at a time just poring over documents, or meeting with important people.

Yet, they were there. Occasional flashes in a blank space. 

The eye contact, which was often Chaewon’s only means of acknowledging Hyejoo’s existence. As the weeks passed, though, Hyejoo began to notice that Chaewon never really had the habit of making eye contact with her other bodyguards, if she would look at them at all. 

She could be standing outside the office. Helping to file some documents in her spare time. Even just having lunch. She’d look, find the familiar head of dark hair, and see piercingly green eyes staring back at her. 

It took her a few more weeks to realise that Hyejoo had been looking for her, too. 

She didn’t understand.

She couldn’t. 

  
  
  
  


Nearing August, Chaewon and a fair number of mafia members drove two hours out to a container yard near the outskirts of Seoul to meet representatives from the gang she’d been in discussions with. The location was supposedly where the shipments were slated to arrive sometime soon, and she wanted to check it out for herself. 

The meeting had started out relatively normally. Chaewon and the leader of the other gang were talking in the open, each with two bodyguards flanking them. The rest of the gang members stood a respectful distance away, at ease, but alert for danger. 

It was an unusually balmy night, for August. Hyejoo had even opted to leave headquarters without donning her jacket. It was already uncomfortable - she despised container yards. They were always too large, with too many patches of darkness to keep track of at once. She was particularly alert in them, always. The fact that Chaewon was just in front and to the left of her did nothing to ease her slight jitters. 

She scanned their surroundings alertly, trying to repress the urge to shift her weight onto one foot. Standing still was difficult. 

Pause. 

There was something that caught in her throat. She slowly swept her eyes back to a dark spot between two containers about twenty metres away from the congregation, the hairs on the back of her neck standing. She swore there was something moving there. 

She stared, hard. 

Something moved, so quickly that she would’ve missed it if she hadn’t been staring right at the spot. 

Two arms. Two hands, clasped around a gun. Then a body had emerged, adjusting the gun’s angle. It was an awkward one. She didn’t remember Chaewon mentioning wanting to assassinate the other gang leader. She traced the line of fire, heart leaping into her throat. She couldn’t tell where it was aimed at, but the only people within semi-clear range were her, Wonwoo...

And Chaewon herself. 

Fear seized her, a fear so strong it nearly paralyzed her. 

No. Not Chaewon. 

All of that had happened in a span of seconds; one moment Hyejoo was noticing the gun and cancelling possible targets out, and the next, she was barrelling in front of Chaewon while pulling her gun from its holster, hearing nothing but her own deafening heartbeats. She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t even think. She just  _ moved _ . There were shouts of surprise from both sides when she raised her arms, aimed at the centre of the target, and fired. 

Two gunshots rang in the air simultaneously. 

The assassin dropped to the ground. She’d nailed him in the chest.

A second later, fire had erupted in her right arm. She nearly dropped her gun from the sheer shock. 

_ No no no no-  _

She panicked. She did. It  _ burned _ , like someone was pressing molten iron to her skin. 

“Did he get anyone? Did he get anyone?” Wonwoo hissed as he moved closer to block Chaewon, cursing and firing off instructions into his communication device. 

Hyejoo heard his voice in real time and in her ear, but her heart was beating so loudly she couldn’t even process it. She hadn’t even lowered her arms, though her they were shaking hard and it burned so much she had to grit her teeth. She risked a glance; the bullet had grazed the side of her forearm, ripping through her shirt sleeve and leaving a nasty wound behind. There was barely any blood. She had been extremely lucky. Any more to the right and it would’ve hit flesh. 

“Hyejoo!” Wonwoo had barked, snapping her out of it. “We’re leaving. Get it together.” 

She looked back. The group had already started moving. She blinked, hard, then forced her leaden legs to move her forward, and finally allowed herself to lower her arms. They were shaking so much that she couldn’t even keep them up, anyway.

The mafia members had formed a sort of loose formation such that Chaewon and her bodyguards were in the middle. Preliminary layers of protection. Hyejoo gnashed her teeth as they ran, the tips of Chaewon’s black hair whipping her in the face. Chaewon was cursing audibly, clearly furious that they’d been betrayed. She forgot her pain for the moment, focusing on the rhythm of her steps. 

Headlights stopped them at the next clearing. One of the gang’s black Mercedes Benz’ pulled to a halt in front of the group, kicking up clouds of dust. The rest followed up behind. 

Wonwoo rushed forward, opening the door to the backseat and shielding Chaewon as she entered the car. Breathing heavily, Hyejoo rounded the back of the car to open the door on the other side. Sweat dripped into her eye when she slid in next to Chaewon and slammed the door shut. The driver took a precursory glance behind to check that his passengers were in, then hit the gas. 

Hyejoo couldn’t breathe. It was just - everything was  _ too much _ . She took in ragged breaths through her mouth, forcing her bile back down. Her ears felt like they were muffled and ringing at the same time. Like she was underwater. 

Chaewon had turned to try and find the buckle for her seatbelt, when she paused. Her voice brought Hyejoo back in a second. 

“Son Hyejoo...your arm,” Chaewon had said. It was soft, but Hyejoo had been training herself to hear Chaewon’s voice, no matter the volume. 

Hyejoo looked down. The wound looked worse than she’d thought. It had begun to bleed a little, staining the frayed edges of the hole in her sleeve, the skin around it nightmarishly reddened. She looked up, and saw something that threw her off completely, even if it lasted for the shortest of seconds.

She’d met Chaewon’s eyes. Seen the expression on her face. It betrayed an emotion that Hyejoo had never seen her express, ever. 

Her eyes were wide, pupils dilated, lips slightly parted. 

She didn’t know what it was. 

She didn’t know why it made her  _ frightened _ . 

“Jesus, your arm,” said Wonwoo, fracturing the tension. The expression wiped itself from Chaewon’s face so quickly that Hyejoo was left wondering if she’d just hallucinated it. Wonwoo glared at her. “I asked if anyone got hurt just now!” 

“I - didn’t hear,” Hyejoo said. It wasn’t a complete lie. “My ears were ringing. Anyway, it’s just a graze. It’s fine.” 

She wasn’t lying. The pain wasn’t overwhelming. It was just psychologically taxing, the stress of shooting and getting shot at. The weight of her actions had barely even begun settling on her; she’d just  _ killed _ someone. With one squeeze of the trigger and one bullet. Just like that. It was a lot to handle at once. 

“It’s fine before that wound gets infected,” Wonwoo said robustly. “We’ll go to your apartment, it should be closer than headquarters. Get it patched up.” There were things he left unspoken, too. 

She understood, even if he didn’t voice them out loud. The graze was on her master arm. If it got infected or didn’t heal properly, she’d be less efficient in her job until the infection cleared up. And lack of efficiency was...undesirable. 

“...Understood, sir.” 

  
  
  
  


Hyejoo nearly bit through the skin of her lip when Wonwoo cleaned her wound, forcing back the tears springing to her eyes. She’d kept her eyes trained on Chaewon’s back, on the reflections off her dark hair, when he swabbed at the wound with alcohol. 

Something heavy was pressing against her chest and refusing to budge. It made everything ache more than usual. 

Her fingers left deep, crescent-shaped indentations in her palm from clenching when he was done. 

“Visit the infirmary and take some antibiotics when you come in tomorrow. Get the wound checked for infection a few times a week,” Wonwoo instructed, watching as she downed some painkillers. Hyejoo thanked him. Her mouth was dry.

It was nearing eleven when he finished. He stood, smoothing the wrinkles in his shirt. “Miss Chaewon? Shall we leave?” 

Chaewon didn’t answer for a few seconds. Then she turned, expression unreadable. “Give me three minutes.” Wonwoo quirked his brow slightly, but bowed his head. He followed the driver, who was standing guard by the door, out of the apartment, leaving the two girls alone. 

Hyejoo was apprehensive. She hadn’t been alone with Chaewon since the night the older girl passed out from exhaustion. This time, Chaewon was very much awake, and more in touch with her senses than the previous night. 

They stared at each other. Dark brown on green. 

Chaewon’s jaw ticked. 

“I’ll make sure the body is disposed of by tomorrow.” 

The words sounded so wrong in Chaewon’s high pitched tone that Hyejoo almost laughed dryly, had she not felt like throwing up. It was too soon. The weight of it. The fact that Chaewon was speaking of it as though she was talking about taking the garbage out. 

It sickened her. It sickened her to think that if time had been rewound, she wouldn’t hesitate to shoot the guy again. 

She’d killed, because it was either that man, or it was Park Chaewon. 

She didn’t know what scared her more: the fact that she’d just killed someone, or the fact that she felt no remorse at all.

No. She only felt guilty because a small part of her, the part that remembered the girl who went to church on Sundays and volunteered at youth camps, was someone has been raised to follow and fear the rules.

Despite herself, she smiled. It was humourless. Almost creepy. It wasn’t the situation to be smiling. Chaewon’s eyebrows twitched downwards a fraction.

“The mafia has changed me,” said Hyejoo quietly. In any other situation, she’d never share personal thoughts with anyone in the mafia, much less her boss. But there, in her apartment, away from anything work-related, she could almost delude herself into thinking that they were two regular teenagers. “I just killed a man, but I...feel almost indifferent.”

Chaewon was still staring at her, even though Hyejoo had looked away. “What’s your point?” 

“Should I feel bad that he might’ve had loved ones waiting for him? People who will grieve when they never seen him again?” 

Chaewon seemed to be in a more patient mood that night. Hyejoo was surprised she’d even bothered asking her to get to the point. 

“No. That would be a foolish practice to adopt. You kill, or you get killed,” Chaewon said curtly. “Besides, members of a gang know not to get too attached. Anything and everything is expendable. If that assassin had people he loved, it’s no one’s fault but his own.”

Normally, Hyejoo would know that she’d be pushing it. But maybe it was the painkillers, or it was something else, that propelled her to say what cropped up in her mind. 

“So you’ve never been in love with someone?” 

Chaewon’s eyes had flashed dangerously. They were enthrallingly bright. Even if they signified her impending doom, Hyejoo couldn’t bring herself to look away. 

Then Chaewon did something that surprised her. She had pulled her suit jacket off, unbuttoned the cuff of her left sleeve, and pushed the fabric up. She turned her wrist so that Hyejoo could see her butterfly tattoo. When she spoke, her voice was controlled. 

“This butterfly is a  _ Morpho peleides _ butterfly. My mother used to say that I reminded her of one. They were beautiful, fragile, yet they were able to best their enemies. She called me her  _ little butterfly _ . She was the only person I ever loved,” Chaewon’s voice grew noticeably flatter. “When I was seven, the gang got into a huge fight. She never came back.”

Hyejoo’s lips parted, then closed again. 

“So, to answer your question, I have loved someone, but I have never been  _ in love. _ I don’t know what that feels like, and frankly, I don’t want or need to.” 

It felt like someone was pressing a hot iron down Hyejoo’s throat. She felt, for the first time in a long while, awful for saying something. She swallowed dryly. “I - I ran my mouth. I’m sorry,” Hyejoo murmured, watching as Chaewon tugged her sleeve back over her tattoo. “I don’t think this is how you wanted to spend your three minutes.” 

Chaewon had regarded her then, her gaze flat. “You don’t really know much about me.” 

Hyejoo didn’t understand. 

“I’m curious though, Son Hyejoo. What is being in love like?” 

Chaewon asked it with the matter-of-fact tone of an arts major asking a question about quantum physics. Like it was a distant, unexplored concept that she was not associated with. Like she wasn’t going to commit herself to understanding it fully. Hyejoo blinked at her, sinking in an ever-growing cesspool of confusion and surprise. That was not something she’d ever expect to hear coming out from her boss’s mouth. She was caught off guard. 

“I’ve - never been in love either,” Hyejoo said haltingly. Even as she spoke, it felt out of base. She remembered asking her mother the exact same question when she was a kid, and as a teenager, she still couldn’t answer it. “I think it’d be different for every person. My mother told me that you’d just -  _ know _ .” 

She bit the inside of her cheek, studying the clear green eyes that stared back at her, knifelike. 

She didn’t understand.

  
  
  
  


Why was her chest  _ hurting _ ? 

  
  
  
  


Chaewon quirks an eyebrow at her. Then she exhales through her nostrils. She looks unimpressed. “That’s not very informative.” 

“You can try falling in love,” Hyejoo suggests blandly. She hopes Chaewon can tolerate some level of dry sarcasm. “Lots to pick from in the gang.” 

The mafia leader scoops her jacket up from the coffee table, smoothing out the wrinkles in the lapel meticulously. Hyejoo wonders if she’s somehow crossed a line she didn’t expect to. As Chaewon folds the jacket in half and drapes it over an arm, she looks up. 

“And if I did fall in love,” Chaewon says, quietly, “If I fall in love, how would that affect you?”

The question is such a bolt out of the blue that Hyejoo is genuinely bewildered. Is Park Chaewon just taking the mickey out of her? Is that her idea of a joke? It’s an absurd question, of course. Chaewon is just her boss. There’s really only one answer. She doesn’t know how there can be any more than one.

“It wouldn’t.” 

  
  
  
  


Belatedly, as she drowns herself in the silence after they’ve left, she wonders if she was lying.

  
  


-

  
  
  


The first time Hyejoo kills, it ruins her. 

_ (Unknowingly, it starts a hurricane.) _

  
  
  


-

  
  
  


Hyejoo feels unbalanced.

Not physically - her arm healed within two weeks, leaving behind nothing but a shallow five-centimetre-long divot in her forearm and a trauma that faded in half the time - but mentally. 

After she shot the assassin, she’d managed to gain the respect of the other mafia members.  _ Real _ respect. She began getting more involved, sometimes even participating in meetings and sharing her input.

Therein lies the problem. 

At some point, she begins interacting with Chaewon more than ever. It’s no longer interaction through stolen looks and silence, but actual speech. She stands next to Chaewon, close enough to protect her if anyone gets handsy. She spends hours, sometimes on end, staring at Chaewon’s face, paying rapt attention to whatever she’s saying. 

For hours on end, she observes, and absorbs. The intensity of the green eyes. The high-pitched, lilting voice that rises and falls in accordance to mood fluctuations. The rare, crooked tilt of the lips when Chaewon smiles mockingly. The fresh, heady scent of tropical pineapple. 

There’s the feeling of something lodging in her throat when the green shifts to her. She could be imagining it, but the eyes just...never look at angry as she remembers. 

It disarms her. Makes her feel off-kilter, like she’s balancing on a tightrope that’s started to swing. 

It’s especially potent when she recalls the night in her apartment - how the green had looked at her after she’d answered the final question. Almost…

...disappointed. 

It  _ hurts _ . 

This thing, this pressure jammed against her ribs. It makes it hard to breathe. 

She doesn’t understand. 

  
  
  
  


Belatedly, Hyejoo realises that the only things she can remember from meetings are flashes of bright green, red-stained lips, and the scent of tropical pineapple. 

  
  
  
  


It’s all she can think about. 

  
  


-

  
  


Chaewon bleaches her hair sometime in October; for a few days, everyone does a double take when they look at her. It’s not completely yellow - there’s a slightly ashy, pinkish tint that Hyejoo stares at enough to recognise. 

Green eyes. Tropical pineapple. Red lips, framed by wisps of curling blonde hair.

_ Stop. _

  
  


-

  
  


She asks the bodyguards something personal after clocking out, on the first day of November. It’s the first time she asks them anything personal. 

“Um, I’m thinking of getting a tattoo soon. Any ideas for what I should get?” 

The other bodyguards look mildly surprised that she’s addressing them outside of work - usually she just leaves after hours. But, to her relief, they decide to humour her instead of ignoring her. Wonwoo makes a suggestion first.

“A dragon?” 

They delve into discussion over this; she gets suggestions for different dragons, entire sleeve designs, and it eventually dips into identifying what animal she’d embody the most. (“Could be a sick idea,” Wonwoo puts in.) 

“A black cat, maybe,” Mingyu says. 

“A wolf.” 

The bodyguards pause their discussions at the entrance of Park Chaewon’s high-pitched voice. She looks unamused and distinctly uninterested, and seems to be passing by to go somewhere else. She meets Hyejoo’s eyes briefly, before looking away. “I think you’d fit a wolf.” 

Then she walks away as quickly as she’d arrived, leaving the bodyguards silent.

They continue after a span, disregarding her input as a passing remark. Hyejoo gets even more suggestions for animals. She excuses herself after another five minutes, saying that she’d thought of something.

She hasn’t. 

_ A wolf. _

She doesn’t understand.

  
  


-

  
  


She wonders if she’s going insane.

  
  
  
  


On the thirteenth of November, Hyejoo gets a few hours to herself. She wraps herself in a coat, tucks her gun deep into an inner pocket, and takes a cab to the shop Wonwoo told her about. She’d made an appointment for eleven in the morning. 

She’s greeted by a woman when she enters - tall, with elegant features, bright red lips and dark hair pulled into a neat ponytail. She’s wearing a tank top, ripped jeans and Converses. Her toned arms are covered in tattoos, all the way up to her neck. She smiles, though it doesn’t meet her eyes or seem very enthusiastic, and sticks a hand out. 

“I’m Ha Sooyoung. You must be Son Hyejoo?”

Hyejoo shakes her hand, hoping that hers aren’t too clammy. “Yes.” 

“Have you got any ideas for what you want?” Sooyoung asks as she leads Hyejoo deeper into the shop. The tables are littered with inks and tattooing paraphernalia. Hyejoo sheds her coat as Sooyoung picks a hefty book of designs up. “If you don’t, you can pick a style and look through this for some inspiration. I recall you said you wanted something small when you called, right?”

Hyejoo did say she wanted to get something small. But what, she still has no idea. She stares blankly at the thick book in her hands, a design of a rather gruesome skull grinning back at her from the first page. 

She’s nervous, of course. Tattoos involve a needle jabbing her skin thousands of times. She gnaws at her lower lip, steeling herself. She doesn’t want to back out now, not when she’s already here. She’s certain she wants to leave with a tattoo.

“First time?” Sooyoung sits on a padded chair and gestures for Hyejoo to pull a chair up for herself. Hyejoo does so, nodding. Sooyoung sounds patient enough, but Hyejoo can tell that she’s a little miffed that her customer had come in with zero idea of what she wants in mind. “Remember that this is permanent. You can get it lasered if you hate it, of course, but you really don’t want to go through the trouble. So, I’d suggest no lover’s names, no dicks, you get it.” 

Hyejoo flips through the book, starting with the simpler designs. There’s a lot of different types of flowers, objects, geometric shapes. She contemplates a crescent moon, pushing her thumb nail into her lower lip. 

“It doesn’t have to be significant,” Sooyoung adds, eyeing her. “You can get a tattoo of something you just like. Or something you think is pretty. Tattoos can have zero meaning besides ‘I thought it looked cool’, if that’s the kind of person you are.” 

She flips through pages of animals. Cats. Dragons. Birds. Wolves.

She stops. Thinks. Something clicks in her mind, something that leaves her certain. 

“Thought of something?” 

She takes her phone out of the pocket of her jeans. Types in a quick google image search and shows Sooyoung. The woman studies the image, lips pursed, then nods. She seems to try for an encouraging smile - her eyes are a little too dead. Hyejoo appreciates the effort nonetheless. 

“Where do you want it placed?” 

Hyejoo considers her arms, or her ribs. Then she decides, touching the spot with the very tips of her fingers. 

“Here.” 

  
  
  
  


She is going insane. 

  
  


-

  
  


The first time Hyejoo gets a tattoo, it’s on her eighteenth birthday. She gets a  _ Morpho peleides _ butterfly on the inside of her right wrist.

_ (The hurricane grows.) _

  
  


-

  
  


Hyejoo is eighteen when her life is changed.

  
  
  
  


Chaewon and a couple of other mafia members, accompanied by their bodyguards, are in one of the organisation’s numerous warehouses, checking on some recent shipments. Hyejoo sticks close to Chaewon, hands held stiffly by her sides, keeping a close eye out. 

The night is quiet; they’re in a rural part of the city. Aside from the very occasional car passing through, it’s nearly dead silent. 

Hyejoo represses the urge to shift from foot to foot. It’s become something of a nervous habit for her. Chaewon is checking off a crate of something illegal, peering covertly into its depths. She seems satisfied. Hyejoo has to tear her eyes from the shifting blonde curls, pursing her lips roughly. Looking around anywhere else is uncomfortable. Everything is just...still.

_ Too  _ still.

She shifts her foot, feeling the hairs on the back of her neck rise. It’s probably nothing. She gets this feeling all the time. It’s nothing. 

She looks at Chaewon again. Her boss is still nose-deep in a crate. She represses the urge to bite her lip. It’s nothing. 

_ BANG! _

Lights flare; in an instant, Hyejoo has her pistol in her grip, barely reeling from the shock. The sound is deafening - gunshots, the warehouse door slamming open. A flood of gun-wielding maniacs running in. 

“Shit! We’re being ambushed!” Someone yells. The mafia members closest to the doors begin firing. Hyejoo shifts, cursing quietly under her breath, shields a startled Chaewon with her body, and steers her towards the back exit. Wonwoo and Siwan, who had burst in after hearing the gunfire, close in around Chaewon, guns raised. Bullets slam into the wall above their heads. 

“Get Miss Chaewon to safety! I’ll help hold them off,” Hyejoo shouts as dust rains upon their heads. They’re far back enough that it’s too dark to see them, but it won’t be like that soon enough. There’s way too many, and they’re already losing precious time. 

She turns back to face the enemies, raising her gun, ready to aid in Chaewon’s safe escape. Her arms barely shake anymore.

_ She’s doing it again. _

“Hyejoo,” Chaewon says. 

Not Son Hyejoo. Just Hyejoo. 

The gunfire roars in Hyejoo’s ears, but she’s been acclimating to hearing her boss’s soft voice wherever. She turns, exhaling hard, sweat dripping down her forehead and her cheeks. 

_ Looking at me like that. _

It’s that. That expression again. The widened eyes, the dilated pupils. 

The  _ fear _ . 

Hyejoo feels her heart in her mouth. It  _ hurts _ . 

She doesn’t understand.

Park Chaewon is just her boss. 

Her lips press into a thin line, and she shoves Chaewon towards the door, towards the waiting arms of her other bodyguards. 

She’s just doing her job.

So  _ why _ ?

A bullet whizzes over her head, embedding itself in the wall. Hyejoo fires in return. Two men fall. There’s  _ so many _ . She fires and fires until her clip runs out-

_ BANG! _

She hears her own grunt before she feels something hit her left arm, hard, dousing her jacket in red. She hisses a curse through gritted teeth, jamming a fresh magazine into her pistol and cocking it, her left arm shaking violently. The bullet bit through two layers of clothes and embedded itself in flesh. Her adrenaline is blocking the pain, and yet...

Oh, God, does everything  _ hurt _ .

_ Why am I always so afraid... _

She fires again, and again, gritting her teeth. She tastes blood on her lips. 

_ ...that I’ll never see her again? _

Green eyes. Tropical pineapple. Red lips, framed by wisps of curling blonde hair.

  
  
  
  


Hyejoo wonders if she knew all along. 

  
  
  
  


That she’s become so good at lying, she doesn’t realise she’s been lying to herself.

  
  
  
  


_ Ah _ .

  
  


-

  
  


The first time Hyejoo falls in love, she realises it a little too late. 

_ (It destroys.) _

  
  


-

  
  


Chaewon leans her head against her palm, staring blankly out the car window. 

The streetlights pass in a blur; the adrenaline is pumping so fast that she isn’t sure she can concentrate on anything outside. 

No. 

It isn’t the adrenaline. 

She doesn’t realise her hands are shaking until she sees them in the window’s reflection. 

Stupid. It’s stupid. Her hands don’t shake. Her hands  _ never _ shake. 

She can almost feel Wonwoo’s eyes on her, but he doesn’t speak. That’s something she’s always been enforcing. She doesn’t show care for her staff beyond necessary, and they do the same. She doubts she’s ever had a personal conversation with these people in her lifetime, and some of them have even watched her grow up. 

She doesn’t care. She  _ shouldn’t  _ care. 

_ No.  _

She breathes in, hard. 

It hurts. The space in her chest. She doesn’t understand.

It’s stupid. 

She closes her eyes. It’s there, imprinted on the black of her eyelids. The intensely dark eyes. The triangular-shaped lips. The feeling of warmth. Protection. The face they’d left behind. 

Had she always been looking? 

She was only mildly interested that night when she’d asked Wonwoo to beat that drunk guy up. She was only mildly interested when she’d seen her progress during shooting practice. Was it when she’d passed out? Was it then? 

Chaewon can’t lie to herself. 

She’d felt it -  _ hoped  _ for it, even. A fraction of what she condemns. She’d been looking, subconsciously. For someone who cares about her even when she says she despises it. For someone whom she trusts enough to understand her. She’s been doing it over, and over. And it came to her, if only for a moment. 

She’d always scorned it. What could care do to save a rusting heart? 

It’d taken her a while to realise. It’d given her hope. 

Stupid. She shouldn’t  _ hope _ . Her position is a rough, and lonely one. There is no space for hope. 

Stupid.

Why does she feel short of breath? 

_ Stupid _ . 

_ Why?  _

“Turn around,” she says. It comes out hoarse and soft and is drowned by the sound of the engine. She clears her throat, raises her voice. “Turn around. We’re going back to the warehouse.” 

The driver meets her eyes in the rear-view, then looks back at the road. He slams the brakes, and spins the car in a sharp U-turn. 

She feels both Wonwoo and Siwan’s eyes on her now, and she refuses to acknowledge either of them. She knows what questions they want to ask. She can’t answer. 

She doesn’t know the answer to any of them, either. 

  
  
  
  


They hear the gunshots while driving up. Chaewon pulls her pistol out and cocks it. 

“Miss Chaewon,” Wonwoo, who had been silent the entire ride back, finally speaks up. She looks at him, evening out her temper. “It could still be dangerous in there. Are you sure-” 

“Yes,” she says, cutting him off, eyeing him beadily. She is Park Chaewon. She does not second-guess herself, especially not in front of her staff. She has dignity. Wonwoo bows his head, and she sees him pull his gun from his jacket, lips pursed in a rigid line. She herself keeps her face in a neutral mask, despite having to consciously stop her lower lip from trembling. 

She might be cold, cynical, and uncompromising, but it doesn’t mean that she doesn’t feel fear. 

She does. God, she  _ does _ . 

The car pulls up at the back entrance. The driver had killed the headlights way before entering the industrial park, so they’re plunged into near darkness. 

The gunfire is too loud. Then it’s...too quiet. 

Chaewon unbuckles her seatbelt, throat raw. Her stomach feels hollow. 

“Shit,” Siwan mutters, scrambling from the front seat. “Call for an ambulance,” he says to the driver. Chaewon opens the car door, stepping out into the cold that bites at her skin. Siwan steps up in front of her, leading the way to the back entrance, index finger on the trigger of his gun. He slowly slides the door open, ready to fire, and peeks in. His voice is soft when he speaks. “Clear.” 

They enter the building, crouching to make their movements harder to detect, though it’s nearly silent aside from breathing, shifting, and the world slowly tilting. It’s dark; a number of the lights have been blown out, but it’s not difficult to see the red splattered all over the ground, the crates, everything. Chaewon hears her own breathing audibly now, panic reddening the edges of her vision. There doesn’t seem to be any movement beyond their own. 

Wonwoo speaks, obviously controlling his panic. 

“Survivors. We have to find survivors. Be careful.” 

Siwan identifies bodies as they pass by. Already there are a few of their own. Chaewon feels it slowly begin to consume her. Panic.

  
  
  
  


That’s when she sees her.

_ No.  _

_ No. No!  _

  
  
  
  


Chaewon runs. She doesn’t care. Wonwoo sprints after her, cursing. She can’t hear. She can only see her, sitting up against a crate. The shallow rise and fall of her shoulders. The blood. Everywhere. Chaewon nearly slips in it when she nears her, knees giving way. There’s so much. 

“Hyejoo,” Chaewon says. Her voice breaks halfway through the name. “Hyejoo.” 

There’s too much. She knows it. 

Hyejoo’s eyes are dull. They meet Chaewon’s in the semi-darkness. Chaewon reaches forward, compelled by something otherworldly, touching her fingertips gently to Hyejoo’s cheek, as though that would save her. As though anything could save her. 

She doesn’t even know if Hyejoo can  _ see _ her, but then her lips move, parting, and Chaewon wants to believe that she can. 

“Chae-” Hyejoo’s voice is so quiet, Chaewon has to lean forward to hear what she’s saying. “Chaewon. I never thanked you. For saving me.” 

Her voice gets weaker even as she speaks. She coughs, and blood coats her lips. She looks like she’s beyond feeling pain. 

“Hyejoo,” Chaewon whispers. 

_ Not her. Please. Not her. _

“I - I care,” Hyejoo’s eyes are nearly closed. “about you. Chaewon.” 

Even in this state, she’s talking about Chaewon. Even when her life is slowly and irreversibly slipping away from her, she’s the one doing the comforting. 

This is Son Hyejoo. An eighteen year old girl, ruined by the cruelty of the world. Ruined by her. 

_ Not Hyejoo. _

“Please,” Chaewon tries to say, but it doesn’t come out. She can’t. She’s crying. The tears drip down her face, and she heaves, and heaves, and she just can’t  _ stop _ . 

_ It hurts.  _

“Don’t...cry,” Hyejoo’s voice is barely a whisper. She tries to raise her hand. Chaewon clasps it, gently, bringing it up to her face. Hyejoo brushes her fingers against her cheek, so weak that it’s like a breeze against her skin. Hyejoo’s staring at her as her eyes close. 

“Chae...won.”

_ I’m right here. _

_ Don’t go.  _

_ Please. _

Her fingers slacken. 

_ I’m right here. _

  
  
  
  


Chaewon slowly lowers her hands. She doesn’t cry out loud, but the tears blur her vision, blur everything. She can’t hear. Can’t see. 

Hyejoo’s sleeve slips a little as she lowers her hands into her lap. Chaewon blinks.

It’s there, on her wrist. Almost identical, except for the size. 

The blue is blinding. It’s sickening. 

So that’s the tattoo she chose to get. 

_ Fuck.  _

  
  
  
  


_ It hurts. _

  
  
  
  


She doesn’t know how long she’s been here.

Wonwoo finds her, sometime later, kneeling in a pool of crimson, Hyejoo’s hand clasped in both of her own. She cries, and cries, and even though Wonwoo looks both wretched and confused he pulls her away, saying that it’s not safe for them to stay, that the ambulances are beginning to arrive, that they have to go. She wants to be angry at him, at Siwan, but she knows she isn’t really angry. It isn’t her place to be angry, not now.

She stands, watching blood begin to drip onto the tattoo, and she can’t look. She can’t. 

So she turns away, and leaves an intangible part of her behind. 

  
  
  
  


They drive in silence. Chaewon blots her face with a wet wipe, removing the blood and grime, and any traces of tears. 

This isn’t the first time they’ve come under attack and lost this many people. It’d happened, many times under her dad’s leadership, and several times under hers. It’s her responsibility to oversee regrouping, to make sure the organisation doesn’t topple from such crises. 

For the first time, she’s at a loss. 

She can’t explain this. This feeling. She’s had dozens of men die under her name, for her. She’d always felt remorseful about their deaths. She wasn’t a monster. But not once has it made her chest feel like a cavity that will never be filled. Like her lungs are being squeezed. Like she’s this helpless. 

Not once has it ever  _ ruined _ her like this. 

_ It hurts. _

Park Chaewon is nineteen, with the weight of the world on her shoulders. 

  
  
  
  


Park Chaewon is nineteen, when her search comes to an end. 

  
  


-

  
  


_ (It leaves heartbroken fragments behind.) _

  
  


-

  
  


They hold the funeral at headquarters a week later. 

Chaewon sees her father in the front row, wearing his one set of Funeral Clothes, which consists of this tailored black suit and a white button-up underneath. She’s wearing the exact same thing, because he’d picked it out for her years ago. Forced her to wear it to every one of these events. This time she adds a skinny black tie, because she doesn’t want them to match. 

There’s a procession, and then Chaewon is up on the podium, hands gripping the sides hard as she rattles her speech off by heart. She sees her father nodding at her words - encouragingly? She turns away, anger swelling in her chest.

She despises him.

She despises him for putting her in this position. She despises him for giving her this power. She despises him. 

There’s a short list of names she has to read out, according to seniority. The names are amplified tenfold by the microphone, and yet, when she reaches the last one, the youngest and the newest, there’s silence. 

She swallows. Takes in a rattling breath. 

“Son Hyejoo.” 

Everyone’s eyes are on her. She bows her head, leading a minute of silence, wherein all she can concentrate on is the buzzing in her ears, the rage making her pulse spike, and the painful waves that crash into her, over and over. 

_ It hurts. _

The minute passes. She bows lowly, and is escorted off the stage by Siwan. She sees her father rising from his seat, and she quickens her pace, biting her lip harshly. 

She despises him for being in the mafia. She despises him for putting all this weight on her. 

  
  
  
  


No.

She despises herself. 

  
  
  
  


She locks the door once she returns to her office. It’s the only place that she knows will be quiet. There’s just too much happening today.

It’s been a week. A week of burying herself in her work. Her father had come round to visit sometime in the middle of it, and she’d buried herself even more. She hates him. She hates the world. 

She knows she’s just trying to find people to blame, because it’s eating her up from the inside. She blames her father for putting her, and by extension, her staff in danger. She blames herself for leaving. She blames herself for not going back sooner. 

It’s been a week. Normally, she’d have gotten over it by now. 

She can’t stop  _ thinking  _ about her. 

It shouldn’t be like this. Son Hyejoo was just her bodyguard. 

So  _ why _ ? 

She feels it again. A dull, clawing ache in her chest, that spikes so acutely she winces. 

So she leans back, closes her eyes, and drowns herself in the silence.

  
  


-

  
  


She wonders if she’s going insane.

It doesn’t stop, even after the funeral. 

If anything, it just gets worse.

  
  
  
  


She is going insane. 

  
  


-

  
  


The second time Chaewon cries, it’s when she gets her second tattoo.

  
  


-

  
  


The second time Chaewon gets a tattoo, it’s on her twentieth birthday. 

When the needle first touches her skin, she nearly flinches. 

It hurts more than she remembers. 

She clenches her fist. Closes her eyes. She doesn’t want them to see her cry. 

  
  
  
  


She does cry eventually, when the tattoo artist is done. 

A wolf on her right arm. The butterfly on her left. 

It’s too much. Everything. 

  
  
  
  


_ You’d just - know.  _

Ah.

So this is what she meant. 

  
  
  
  


This is what being in love is like.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are super welcome, tell me what u think! 
> 
> Extra note: for anyone that noticed/cares, the narrative actually changes to present tense the moment Hyejoo falls in love with Chaewon :-)
> 
> Here’s some art that I did for [Chaewon](https://twitter.com/moonfluffing/status/1172155977954578432) and [Hyejoo](https://twitter.com/moonfluffing/status/1167801043251449856)
> 
> Come scream at me on twitter I promise I’m nice  
twt: @moonfluffing


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